A Shot Of Inspiration

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Guest Melanie Gao sits down alongside host Greg Stephens to talk about her journey from long-time employee to quitting and living in a tiny house in the woods for a year without a clear picture of her future–and how she was all the better for it. Her willingness to give herself a break helped heal her as a single mother and soon-to-be empty-nester, all while surviving the pandemic with a dangerously hypervigilant headspace.

Open your eyes to the opportunity that’s out there for you and get yourself into the right mindset, one that lets things fall into place without forcing your agenda. You can still make and achieve future goals while loosening your grip on the steering wheel! Melanie also shares how she surrendered control and used new exercises to heal from childhood trauma–and you can, too–on this episode of A Shot of Inspiration.

3 Key Takeaways

• Share your stories even if you don’t feel like they’re inspirational. Telling yours will help others look at their stories from a different perspective. 
• Sometimes you have to build the plane while you’re flying. 
• Place yourself in the right direction and learn to let go. Things only fall into place when you stop forcing them elsewhere.

Resources
Michael Singer, The Surrender Experiment

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Justin Hale, a master trainer with Crucial Learning, sits down with host Greg Stephens in the hopes of helping listeners see how to be better equipped to manage their time  and be more productive without an imbalance of stress. He shares his inspiring story of starting as a rookie with no experience, eventually working his way up to become a go-to person for getting things done at work–all while visiting his wife and premature child who stayed in the hospital for over 80 days and while taking care of his other children in the role of a single parent. 

Combine his story with a background in social psychology to apply the science of human behavior to improve your life with time management methods, good mentors, and practicing deliberate practice today on A Shot of Inspiration. 

3 Key Takeaways

• You cannot underestimate the impact of a good mentor. Justin shares the impact one mentor made on his entire career by placing him at a crossroads of the right people. 
• It’s only YOUR fault you have a schedule filled with so many commitments that you become overwhelmed. Own that and reprioritize your activities so the most important ones are guaranteed to get done. 
• The best time to put this play into practice is when everything feels busy and chaotic; don’t wait for a better time to try it out!

Resources

Rookie Smarts by Liz Wiseman

One Productive Minute

About Justin Hale

Justin is a dynamic keynote speaker and trainer who has presented to more than 400 audiences from small team meetings to large keynote events. His research and writing has appeared in dozens of publications, including Harvard Business Review, CNBC.com, Fox Business, Bloomberg, and Fast Company. Justin’s coaching and advice are published regularly in the Crucial Skills newsletter, which now has more than 300,000 subscribers. In both his writing and speaking, Justin focuses on topics such as personal productivity, habit change, crucial conversations, team accountability, change management, and bridging generational gaps in the workplace.

Justin’s most recent work focuses on individual and team productivity, and he’s partnered with some of the world’s leading experts on productivity and habits to design and deliver powerful learning experiences on those topics. He frequently shares tips and best practices on his YouTube and social media channel, One Productive Minute.

VitalSmarts is a Top 20 Leadership Training Company that enables the world's leading organizations to achieve new levels of performance by changing employee behavior. VitalSmarts has worked with 300 of the Fortune 500.

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Wanda Howard helps parents to raise emotionally healthy and confident kids, but she herself had to find her way out of a suicidal past and learn how to parent her own kids differently–she has struggled her whole life with depression, anxiety, and bipolar disorder. Wanda shares her passion for helping parents know how to raise their kids in a way that will enable them to succeed in all areas of life based on the way their brain operates.

Join her alongside host Greg Stephens for this episode of A Shot of Inspiration to learn to identify what makes your child truly happy. Recognize the behavioral cues that indicate depression and get instruction on how to address a child who suffers from depression in a way that is helpful to them. Discover the importance of founding your life on truth and letting it transform and heal your life. 

3 Key Takeaways

• Stop asking yourself, “How do I teach my kids?” Instead ask, “How do I treat my kids?”
• It’s simple to know if you’re treating your kids right or wrong by assessing how it makes you feel. What are the relationships that you enjoy going back to? Use them as an example. 
• When kids come to you with all-encompassing words like “Nobody in the world likes me,” don’t justify the feeling. Instead, give them comfort and then ask “Is that really true?”

Resources

Instagram: wandahoward.live

Wandahoward.com

About Wanda Howard

Wanda believes that parenting is the single most important job in the world, and if she can help moms know how to lead their kids confidently forward through big changes, they'll use that influence to create homes where every kid feels belonging and where everyone loves to return home. That's the "why" that led her to create Traditions of Truth and acquire techniques that align with your values and teach you to  parent in a way that fulfills you.

How much mental energy would you conserve if you knew EXACTLY what to do for your kids now to create the family life you dream of?

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Reta Clyde is a master trainer with Crucial Learning who has a passion for helping others overcome obstacles and reach their full potential. Reta was born with a birth defect that caused physical limitations on her entire left side of her body. Despite these challenges, Reta has never let her limitations stop her from achieving her goals. She has always approached obstacles with the mindset of "figure it out," a lesson that began early in her youth. This has led to a lifetime of overcoming challenges and inspiring others to do the same.

She shares her story today on A Shot of Inspiration to help you learn to identify YOUR why and willingly share it with others. Get rid of your fear of failure and use it as a tool to push past your boundaries and foster personal growth. Make the shift in how you look at the obstacles in your life and become better equipped to help talented people come to understanding by teaching on a personal level. 

3 Key Takeaways

• Implement Reta’s “Figure it Out” mindset; if there doesn’t look like there’s a way through the obstacle in your path, go around it, under it, or over it. 
• When you ask someone why they do what they do, it opens you up to a new level of human connection and you begin to relate to them, however unlikely. 
• Don’t miss the talented individuals in your organization because you only communicate in one way; start to teach people on a personal level. 

Resources

cruciallearning.com

About Reta Clyde

Reta is passionate about learning and understands different learning styles. For more than 10 years she has worked in training and development, and managed leadership development programs for a Fortune 100 company. She's a brilliant storyteller, trainer, and coach, and brings enthusiasm to everything she does.

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Have you been looking for a way to create positive relationships with business professionals, managers, or employees? Maybe you've been trying to find a way, but the conversation never ends with the desired result. Today on A Shot of Inspiration, host Greg Stephens and Guest Gregory Sammis tell you why you may be talking about the wrong things–and how you can remedy that. 

Greg Sammis, communications coach and master trainer of several years, will show you 3 ways that Crucial Conversations can help people build better relationships by teaching them to identify and manage emotions, effectively communicate, and resolve conflict during difficult conversations. His promise: if you are honest with yourself and why you’re having the conversation, remain transparent, and are willing to listen, you will see your relationships transform.

3 Key Takeaways

• You need to be honest with yourself about why you are or are not having the conversation. Usually, the first reason that comes to your mind is not the real reason you need to communicate.
• The new communication skills you adopt might seem weird to people who’ve spoken with you before. This is okay! Expect it to take time for them to accept this behavioral change.
• If you want to be 100% honest with people and create a space to truly care about them, you need to remove your own victim mentality that may lurk beneath the surface.

Resources

Website

About Greg Sammis

For close to twenty years, Greg has worked with individuals and teams around the world to develop their skills in communication, goal setting, and leadership.

Greg began his career as a high school teacher, giving students a solid grounding in both academic and life skills. Greg transitioned to the corporate world and took on Learning and Development Facilitator and Program Manager positions in bay area companies including Electronic Arts.

In his career, he has worked both as an internal and an external consultant, designing and delivering leadership and management development programs. He also facilitated ropes course events focused on communication and team building. His background in experiential education and brain-based learning, coupled with his open and friendly facilitation style, creates a safe learning environment where people can challenge preconceived notions, take risks, give and receive feedback, and ultimately learn skills needed for them to perform at the highest level possible and live lives of substance and contribution.

Greg has worked with teams across the globe, from Malaysia and Romania, to Casper, Wyoming. Along with international audiences, Greg has worked with students, teachers, and most recently teams of engineers, managers, and executives in Silicon Valley companies including such clients as Google, Genentech, Salesforce, VMware, and Zynga.

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Host Greg Stephens is joined today by Doug Cornfield, Author, Podcast Host, and co-founder of Disability Dream and Do, to talk about his “collision of souls” with famous athletes Dave Clark and Dave Simmons, his journey co-publishing a book, giving  inspirational speeches, and, as the end goal, helping host baseball camps for children with disabilities.

Learn why failure, as Doug explains it, is only an opportunity for growth, illustrated by heartwarming examples from his life of how people–and children, especially–are capable of so much more than they think if given the opportunity to learn. Be inspired to test your own limits and help others to grow to their potential on this episode of a Shot of Inspiration.


3 Key Takeaways

• If things don’t work out the way you planned, they STILL work out. Make yourself ready to adjust to the storms that happen in life. 
• Failure is not a means for self-doubt or quitting. It should be utilized as a tool for learning and results only in growth. 
• Sometimes, what appears to be “helping” isn’t really helping; find ways to help the people in their life learn without doing it for them. 

Resources
Pulling Each Other Along by Doug Cornfield and Todd Simmons
A Pound of Kindness by Doug Cornfield
Pulling Each Other Along Website
Pulling Each Other Along Podcast


About Doug Cornfield
Doug was a multi-sport athlete in high school and college who focused on Basketball and Track through his first year at Taylor University. After a National Championship in the 800m his freshman year at the NCCAA (National Christian College Athletic Association) Track & Field Championships, Doug focused his full attention to running. Those efforts led to a full scholarship transfer to the University of Georgia (UGA) where he finished as a top contender in the SEC. Doug is still listed on several top ten performances of all time at his alma-mater UGA for both indoor and outdoor Track & Field. During his time at UGA Doug was a member of the Georgia All-State Cross Country Team. He also toured Europe in 1987 racing for Athletes in Action.

Races are not all that Doug won. He became a top sales representative for a fast growing company now known as NEST Entertainment. This led to an appointment as the East Coast Regional Vice President in 1992. Sales for the company grew from $500,000 per year to a cash flow of $500,000 per week in just three years. In the 1990s, Doug went on to work for several other companies as a sales consultant to test new products. In March of 2000 Doug joined Merrill Lynch moving to Corning, NY.

Doug returned to his entrepreneurial roots in 2009 when, during his time with Merrill Lynch, Doug met Dave Clark, the only professional baseball player to pitch from crutches. Doug’s son, Gideon, was born with neither arm developed and one leg shorter than the other and Doug was interested in meeting Dave to learn what Dave’s parents did and how they treated him as a child. Dave became both client and friend giving Doug a chance to learn more about this incredible man’s journey. Doug convinced Dave to partner and promote his amazing life’s story. They are now co-founders of the Dave Clark Foundation, Ltd. The Dave Clark Foundation organizes and hosts disability sports events to encourage others within the disability community to Dream & Do.

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How do you navigate relationships so you can respect both yourself and the other person? Ashley Galassi, certified Master Trainer with Crucial Learning, joins Greg Stephens on this episode to discuss the value of boundaries and building frameworks for effective communication. She shares insight and stories about the work she does and how it transformed her life.

In this episode, you will learn: 

• How our personal relationships can be positively impacted by using the skills taught in Crucial Conversations
• How to have tough conversations in order to achieve our desired outcomes
• How to respect ourselves and others by setting boundaries

About 

Ashley's LinkedIn

Ashley's bio

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Are you married and miserable? Divorced and desperate? Or did you just give up and you’re single and cynical? Is it possible to find happily ever after in a relationship? Bestselling author Evan Money joins Greg Stephens on this episode to offer a fourth option, one in which he marries his bride again every year, and loves it.

Tune into this episode to hear Evan’s story, why happiness is something you create and not a destination, and why you don’t need to compartmentalize your work, worship, and service in life. 

In this episode you will learn: 

• Focus on the here and now. Anxiety and regret feed off of your thoughts about the future and the past. Happiness is possible to create when you focus on today.
• Relationship satisfaction isn’t a destination. It’s something you create together every day.
• Your work, worship, and service don’t need to be separated into their own boxes. A fulfilling life is achieved when you can combine them to flow all at once. 

Resources

EvanLovesSusan.com

MarriageofGreatness.com 

EvanMoney.com

About Evan Money

Happily Married, #1 Bestselling Author, Global Entrepreneur and founder of the Marriage of Greatness movement.

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Sara Yamtich, founder of Conscious Conversion, joins Greg Stephens in this episode to discuss how she continues to chase the passion that she feels helping others find a new paradigm. They talk about her journey from clinical work to federal policy to creating a new holistic media marketing agency. Always following her wanderlust, Sara shares her experience going from Missouri to DC, from Atlanta to Costa Rica, and now living with nature on Maui in Hawaii. Tune into this episode to hear her insight on finding her passion and how you can chase yours.  

3 Key Takeaways

• When you feel pulled toward something, always take that leap of faith. Push past the fear and doubt and jump.
• Practice what you preach. If you have a message you wish to share, live that message.
• Marketing is about reaching the hearts and minds of people, helping them transform from where they are now to where they want to be.

Resources

Conscious Conversion website

Conscious Conversion podcast

Instagram: @resonatewithsara 

About 

Sarah is the founder and CEO of Conscious Conversion, a holistic multimedia marketing agency supporting spiritual entrepreneurs and thought leaders of the new paradigm. She has a Master's in social work and a background that spans federal policy analysis and life coaching.

She also has significant digital marketing experience taking professionalism, team management and client care to a whole new level. She helps clients resonate deeply with their audience so they can transform the planet and give voice to the new earth.

Sarah is the host of Conscious Conversion, a weekly podcast of how we bridge the gap between business and spirit, money and meaning, technology and regeneration in a wildly changing world.

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What does it take to save your life and relationships? From addiction, homelessness, or even just emotional distance with a loved one? Joseph Grenny, bestselling author and founder of The Other Side Academy (TOSA), joins Greg Stephens on this episode to deep dive into how redemption is possible. 

Whether you’ve struggled with substance use for years, become emotionally distant with your spouse or other loved one, or even just have difficulty communicating with a coworker, we all have areas of our lives that need cleaning up. Some take more work than others, but we all need it, and it is possible for all of us.

Join Greg and Joseph as they discuss how you can change your life and the lives of those around you. 

3 Key Takeaways

• Don’t be afraid of the emotional, political, or other heavyweight topics that need to be discussed to progress your relationships.
• When you see a problem that needs correction, don’t wait. That lag time between seeing it and communicating it measures the health of your organization.
• Changing your life takes sacrifice and change in behavior. It is not easy, but it is possible, even for those who have decades of struggle to overcome.

Resources

https://josephgrenny.com/  

https://www.theothersideacademy.com/ 

Joseph Grenny's TedX Talk: "What I learned About Happiness From a Hundred Felons"

About 

Joseph Grenny is a four-time New York Times bestselling author, dynamic keynote speaker, and leading social scientist for business performance. Over the past thirty years, Joseph has delivered engaging keynotes at major conferences including the HSM World Business Forum at Radio City Music Hall. Joseph’s work has been translated into 28 languages, is available in 36 countries, and has generated results for 300 of the Fortune 500.

He also helped found The Other Side Academy in Salt Lake City, mirrored after the Delancey Street Foundation in San Francisco.